12.5 Review of Christopher Brown’s Tropic of Kansas

Looking forward 50 years you’re going to want to have this and the Anarchist Cookbook by your bedside.

When Sig was nine years old his mother got arrested for her protesting. They said they suspected her of terrorist activities. They sent seven men in suits to take her away in black Suburban. She said they just wanted to shut her up.

Brown is great at describing how the empire creeps into the bloodstream.

The name on the door was Mr. Wizard. The shop was at the far end of a run-down strip mall on the other side of town, across the street from the repurposed big box where they had arrested Moco and the others. Tania had left the hotel looking for this place, after seeing an ad on Channel Zero, just a name and address that flashed on one of the test patterns.

Brown manages to sketch out a dystopic ‘Murica in broad strokes that don’t feel lacking. In fact, the ease with which the reader accepts these facts is not only an indictment of our current state of political affairs but also testimony to Brown’s talent.

50 years from now you’ll be able to look back at all the sage advice you’ve gleaned from its pages and liberally doled out and say ‘I told you so’. 12.5 BUY

What a beautiful story. Desiree has an otherworldly quality to her, a banished elf or displaced siren who developed a sharp tongue to protect her true nature in the human world. This, in combination with the very prosaic details of baby bricolage among the three of them, makes for a surreal story. It's quite wonderful. Great job.